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1987
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abluefoxinawildwood-deactivated
The original lyrics to "I Saw Her Standing There" are much more gay than McCartney claims. 💅
#I've been reading your posts and immediately closing tumblr and jumping up to bang my head against a wall btw#so I haven't been liking or starting convo or anything#but I've been thinking about so so much my head hurts#this song in particular actually#all those years I assumed it was Jane bc she was 17 the year this was recorded etc natural assumption#then learned it was written and performed before (Star Club recordings)#then got rid of that idea but never picked up the song in an analysis way again#and then your posts combined with hunch that 'hand'/'holding hands' is actually about. well.#'and I held her hand in mine... and we held each other tight'#the stuff popping into my head right now#'Ey he's reading the queen. That's an in-joke y'know.'#thinking about Paul's /thing/ for Queen Elizabeth II#the use of the word 'queen' vs the title 'Queen' is important#on this it's lowercase#'a queen' not 'The Queen'#guess I'm jumping ahead of those who want to possibly speculate it's referring to her
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Paul had first tried out his disguise on the other Beatles, with complete success, during their July 1964 visit to Stockholm.
PAUL: We’d arrived in the afternoon and everyone was just settling in. I put on this disguise and picked up a camera and went around and knocked on the guys’ doors. I knocked on George’s and he came to the door, quite grumpy, you know, ‘Yeah?’ and I’d never seen him like that before. I said, 'Peresi, yea? Peresi?’ A made-up foreign language, like someone who couldn’t speak English. And he said, 'What d'you want? What d'you want?’ He was quite curt with me, he was getting quite nasty actually, so I just changed the accent, 'Paresi, George, paresi, can’t you tell, it’s Paul speaking. It’s me!’ and I went into my real accent. And he goes, 'Fuckin’ hell!’
Brian Epstein was in the bath with his door open when Paul wandered in.
PAUL: I had a camera round my neck so I looked like a guy pestering people for photos and I had a little card I was flashing. It was one I’d been given by Wesley Rose of Acuff and Rose, the music publishers, and I was impressed by it because it was see-through red plastic. So I pulled this out and said, 'Paresi, paresi?’ Brian said, 'Yes, can I help you?’ I said, 'Paresi? Mr Epsteini? Photo?’ He said, 'No, no, no, not now. Look, can’t you see I’m in the -’ 'No, no, no, Brian, can’t you tell it’s me?’ Freaked him out.
(Paul McCartney: Many Years From Now by Barry Miles)
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Tonight I’m thinking about how in the original lyrics for Here Today the lyrics weren't even "if you were here today" they were "if you were here with me" but Paul crossed it out ...
I get a similar feeling from the lyric development of 'The World Tonight'. I'm always struck that the original lyric in that almost carelessly sad, sultry Home Recording is:
I go back so far, he's in front of me
I mean, I know the change to "...I'm in front of me" is a cool twist but it always makes me stop and listen.
#I always thought of this line (with 'he') being like. Paul going over old media involving John. Remembering. Thinking. Listening.#and feeling like he's seeing him through a different lense and all their time together#'see it in a different light'#but changing it to 'I'm' seems to me like#he's now going forward with a better understanding of himself so that it's kind of like a rebirth#having peeled back the layers of his mind to find his past feeling brand new to him and his future unwritten#there's definitely some play on what being high/tripping was like- the whole seven levels thing#like he's now got some otherworldly wisdom#just the whole idea of going so far back in his past that he feels like all of what happened is ahead of him#to an extent this is like. reminding me of people describing being 'stuck' in memories (can be a symptom of trauma tbh)#in general it's just like. he's got a new understanding of John which means he's got a new understanding of their relationship#which means he's going to have new and different feelings/reactions to long gone events#it's not discovery like it is for us because he was actually there and I think that must be a surreal feeling#lyrics#Paul#The Lyrics#The World Tonight#Here Today
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Hunter Davies bio - chapter 22: beatlemania
"The Daily Telegraph, on 2 November, produced the first leader criticizing the Beatles hysteria. It said the mass hysteria was simply filling empty heads, just as Hitler had done. The Daily Mirror jumped to the Beatles' defence. 'You have to be a real sour square not to love the nutty, noisy, happy, handsome Beatles.' They complimented the Beatles for not relying 'on off-colour jokes about homos for their fun'."
Lest you think the Internet invented inappropriate Nazi comparisons. Also, one has to wonder why such a low bar was being set.
"From 1963 onwards, millions of words were written by people trying to analyse the Beatles' success. It could take a separate book just to cover all the theories that appeared. The first phase of the analyses was based on their sexual attraction. Then the pundits decided the Beatles were of social significance, symbolizing all the frustrations and ambitions of the new emergent, shadow-of-the-Bomb, classless, un-materialistic, un-phoney teenagers. Then the intellectuals moved in, studying their words and music with great intensity, and coming up with some clever interpretations. All of it was true, and still is true. Any reason that anyone has for liking something is true."
I'm posting this for the last sentence, which is so funny to me that he has to point it out. Thanks, Hunter!
#This is such a good description of the stages in which they connected to people#it's something I understood but haven't thought about anyone laying it down in words#because the general image has gone to many places#ideas and assumptions all melting together#people have always been blowing the 'meaning' out of proportion but it's been for the better#their art has been poured over more than- there's no wrangling it in#what I mean is that people have given them their significance#have held many different connections to them#imagine accusing them of aiming for all those little effects though#they are intelligent but they are four members of the general population that made it#they like power over their own lives- they wanted financial security and to do what they love#I think people assume they're radical in some way because they were just being themselves and doing what they wanted to do#and pulled it off with great success (obv there's a bit of distance between their image and their personal life)#but they had power because they brought joy with their own joy#excerpts#Hunter Davies
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Paul and Linda McCartney 1973.
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“I remember very early on apologising because I was so tired, I said, ‘I’m really tired, I’m sorry.’ [Linda] said, ‘It’s allowed.’ I remember thinking, Fucking hell! That was a mind-blower. I’d never been with anyone who'd thought like that: ‘It’s allowed.’ And it was quite patently clear that it was allowed to be tired. I think I’d trained myself never to appear tired. Always to be on the ball. ‘Sorry I’m yawning. I’m sorry,’ which is complete bullshit. It’s a Beatles thing, you had to be there, you had to be on time.”
— Paul McCartney, Many Years From Now
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RingoStarr: Man, this beautiful day is getting better and better we were at the Stella McCartney rollerskating party. What a time we had go get them, Paul, peace, and love.
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Ok this entire letter from PR Paul is gold:
'Dear Mr Low,
I am sorry about the time I have taken to write to you, but I hope I have not left it too late. Here are some details about the group.
It consists of four boys: Paul McCartney (guitar), John Lennon (guitar), Stuart Sutcliffe (bass) and George Harrison (another guitar) and is called ...
This line-up may at first seem dull but it must be appreciated that as the boys have above average instrumental ability they achieve surprisingly varied effects. Their basis beat is off-beat, but this has recently tended to be accompanied by a faint on-beat; thus the overall sound is rather reminiscent of the four in the bar of traditional jazz. This could possibly be put down to the influence of Mr McCartney, who led one of the top local jazz bands (Jim Mac's Jazz Band) in the 1920s.
Modern music, however, is the group's delight, and, as if to prove the point, John and Paul have written over fifty tunes, ballads and faster numbers, during the last three years. Some of these tunes are purely instrumental (such as "Looking Glass", "Catswalk" and 'Winston's Walk") and others were composed with the modern audience in mind (tunes like "Thinking of Linking", "The One After 909", "Years Roll Along" and "Keep Looking That Way").
The group also derive a great deal of pleasure from rearranging old favourites ("Ain't She Sweet", "You Were Meant For Me", "Home", "Moonglow", "You are My Sunshine" and others).
Now for a few details about the boys themselves. John, who leads the group, attends the College of Art, and, as well as being an accomplished guitarist and banjo player, he is an experienced cartoonist. His many interests include painting, the theatre, poetry, and, of course, singing. He is 19 years old and is a founder member of the group.
Paul is 18 years old and is reading English Literature at Liverpool University. He, like the other boys, plays more than one instrument – his specialities being the piano and drums, plus, of course ...'
--Written in 1959 to a journalist he'd met in a pub, before they'd decided on a name, as reproduced in Hunter Davies' The Beatles.
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Paul McCartney writes to Melody Maker, May 2nd, 1970
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Well no one told the circle-jerking bug boys this
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soooooooo legitimately upsetting how few interviewers in the 60s asked john and paul good questions about their artistry. i could listen to them talk about their songs, still unburdened by the weight of a personal falling out, all day
#this post made me so upset because it's such a rare thing actually#it's all questions about their hair and what kind of girls they like and what they think about unrelated topics#or just responding to a stupid rumor or something#we have so little and that's why a lot was asked in retrospect#because there weren't good questions or rather good reporters there to ask them#I don't know how certain people got to the front like that#I dont give a shit about how many times they wash their hair#as much as they feel like which is everyone and it's not interesting or necessary info#but what do you expect from Americans who will express how they feel about your appearance with no regard for you as a person
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okay but Michael Gerber was so based for this